This interview originally broadcast over the KALX airwaves on Monday, August 4th 2025. Full transcript below.
Ears of Maize: [00:00:00] My name is Ears of Maize and uh, with me here today, I have Derya Yildirim.
Derya Yildirim: Yes.
Ears of Maize: And you’re joining us today from Germany?
Derya Yildirim: Yes, exactly, I am in Berlin right now.
Ears of Maize: Berlin is a place that you call home, correct?
Derya Yildirim: My hometown… my home place is actually Hamburg. I’m a Hamburg, Hamburg girl.
Ears of Maize: Nice. What does Hamburg mean to you? Or how is it sort of a collection of who you are today?
Derya Yildirim: Yeah, I was born in Hamburg and the environment and the collective I was surrounded in my neighborhood was very, very unique and very special. Culture, and especially music. was a main resource in my life. Um, because my family is very musical. They’re not musicians, but they are very big music lovers and music enthusiasts and. It came definitely straight from my father to me somehow. And also after my brother’s [00:01:00] contributing to this whole scenario, creating music at home, basically. You call it house music in Germany, like music you do in the house. That’s where I’m from, basically like, doing folk music at home with the family. Yeah, and the neighborhood. When I was a teenager, I was more like a little star in my neighborhood. And, um, extending to other places in Hamburg and later studying and moving to Berlin and stuff, it was growing very, very slowly and amazingly basically, the music in my life.
Ears of Maize: Was there an instrument that you gravitated to first, or a style of music or in a, something that you were turned onto initially that sort of got you motivated in music?
Derya Yildirim: Not really, actually. I was, um, always interested and excited about different kinds of music. Especially because I am, I came from a neighborhood where like it was so, um, multicultural that you had lots of different [00:02:00] experiences, including the school, like listening to R&B and stuff. I’m the nineties, like kid, you know, nineties, two thousands, you know, I was also influenced by that music. But, um, definitely more the music that my parents were listening at home, like folk music, original folk music then interpretations, psychedelic rock music from the sixties and seventies, but also very political music from the eighties, from Turkey. Um,
Ears of Maize: What was the first instrument you picked up?
Derya Yildirim: So, because of this background, I think, and because my father pushed me to so many different instruments, I never focused on any instrument. Like my main instrument was piano and um, oud. it’s another Turkish lute, and bağlama the instrument that I’m playing with my band. It was always there because it’s such a, it’s somehow a very easy instrument if you wanna learn it. Originally it’s made for accompanying [00:03:00] the, the poems from Anatolia, so it’s more like a works a bit like a guitar, you know, if you, if you wanna see it like that.
Derya Yildirim: I start studying it because they opened this new department in Berlin and in Germany I was the only professional saz player by then, and I just moved to Berlin immediately before they closed down this department basically.
Ears of Maize: Is there a primary instrument or one that you enjoy playing most?
Derya Yildiriim: Yeah, it’s this, it’s the, bağlama. it’s quite cool actually to focus on one instrument. I learned that very, very late, like in my mid twenties.
Ears of Maize: Is that an instrument that you see has application for crossover in other genres, or has conversation in other styles of music, or do you find that it’s sort of pigeonholed as to, you know, more of the traditional style?
Derya Yildiriim: It has so many perspectives, This instrument. in general, I think every, you can, especially with folk instruments, I have the feeling they have some something magical that they [00:04:00] can actually relate or being part of any kind of music. As soon as you play a very simple melody with or notes on bağlama, it sounds fake. You know? It doesn’t sound like a normal melody.
Derya Yildiriim: It sounds like a world, you know, but especially the bağlama. Is so magical. I think because it has a very, very deep root in the nature. It was made by the humans to actually protect them. The bağlama is like a weapon for humans. They, they fight with their words, with their melodies, and then also it’s a holy instrument for the Alevi people. It’s a big minority in Turkey and they pray with this instrument, so it’s a very holy instrument. Yeah, it’s carrying so much that you can, you can hear that in the melodies, you know, it’s carrying something. The bağlama could find its place and establish itself in so many different [00:05:00] genres within Turkish culture, like in different genres of Turkish music, um, including tur psychedelic music. It’s the main role in this music. So. It doesn’t work without having a bağlama playing Turkish psych.
Ears of Maize: Yeah. I really appreciate the musicianship and the sound that you build with all of the players and musicians, not only on this recent record that’s out, um, entitled, uh, Yarin Yoksa, but on previous as well, and sort of the, the band that you’ve assembled with Grup Şimşek. And I recently found a video where, um, you’re performing bağlama in front of a orchestra, and I believe it’s somewhere in Germany. And again, to your point, to hear the come through on all those levels of instrumentation and, and orchestral sound, it still has such a voice and such, like the leading sort of role in which it’s all sort of built, especially in sort of that orchestral setting. Is that something that you do often or was it a sort of a, a one-off or experimentation, or do you wanna sort of speak to how do you build your sound and your, your instrumentation [00:06:00] and the orchestra sort of piece?
Derya Yildirim: This is a very nice description. I have the feeling. You got it. Wow. Maybe, I mean, I never analyzed it like that. Um, I’m thankful that you’re saying your opinion and your perspective. I think it’s also related definitely to the arrangement, to actually give some space and finding clever solutions and decisions how to actually place this melodic instrument, which is also a harmonic instrument. But we use it mostly as a melodic instrument for Grup Şimşek.
Derya Yildirim: Like how do you place it and make it shine and make it the core element in your music? We don’t really think so much. We go mostly with our feelings plus taste. No. Yeah. There, there’s nothing to talk about sometimes you can already know if that works or not. Maybe it’s, maybe you need lots of experience with this music and lots of, um, [00:07:00] exchange and rehearsals for the ear, you know, to actually get used to that.
Derya Yildirim: And we’ve been playing for over 10 years now with, with the band, you know, and, um, we are very, very conscious with what we do and why we do things and how we use the elements. And one big new performance idea was playing with the string orchestra at our release party in the Grand Hall of Elbphilharmonie, one of the most important concert halls in the world, which is in my hometown. It’s the only concert hall in the world, which was made on top of, of the water of the river.
Ears of Maize: It’s beautiful. The, the venue itself is stunning.
Derya Yildirim: It’s incredible. Yeah. We had this idea of why not do the release party in this, in this place and making a big thing, and I was working with ensemble resident since 2016. We actually do more contemporary [00:08:00] and sometimes experimental stuff like reinterpreting folk music in the contemporary direction, bağlama and orchestra basically. And then, and then I, I invited them to play with us, our songs, and it was very great decision. Actually. We, we only did three songs, but next year we wanna, we wanna do a whole show.
Ears of Maize: Awesome.
Derya Yildirim: Let’s see how that goes.
Ears of Maize: Yeah. Again, if that’s just the taste of it. I’m a huge fan of the sound.
Derya Yildirim: Yeah.
Ears of Maize: Congratulations. It’s a very sort of international collection of musicians. You’ve got, you know, French members, folks from South Africa, Germany, Turkish roots throughout. How did, how is it that you all sort of assembled yourselves in the band that you have today? How did you find each other?
Derya Yildirim: Again, Hamburg. I’ve been talking so much about Hamburg this today. Hamburg was, is also maybe our hometown of the band because we, we got together in my neighborhood basically in Veddel. It’s a little island on the river, it’s [00:09:00] called Veddel. In the 1900, like 1890. Veddel was one of the points where, where most of the Germans went to America for the American dream.
Derya Yildiriim: You know, leaving Germany from Veddel, from where I’m from, basically, maybe the biggest connection to America. We got together in the theater play, uh, festival. Um, they invited the house band and it was like Graham Mushnik and Antonin Voyant, the Catapulte guys from France. They were part of this band. The idea was collaborating with the neighborhood and it was a very special neighborhood with lots of special people like me and Hava Bekteshi, and [indistinguishable] and so many other people. We worked together. We created music and made a show. I was part of a theater play and stuff, and after the festival, like it was a big residency for three months. We didn’t want to stop. We organized our first tour in England. We played [00:10:00] six shows in London or something.
Derya Yildirim: It was very funny. Yeah. We played in bars and then record our first album name Kar Yagar, and after that album we grow until we made our first America tour.
Ears of Maize: And what was that like, how your expectation versus what it was in reality of bringing this music and touring it here in the States?
Derya Yildirim: I mean, every place in the world has, has a different vibe, you know, and I mean, every city in the world, and then of course the continents, they have different cultures and different behavior from the audience, the, the energies.
Derya Yildirim: But there’s something in common that I, I was very happy to feel it again in America. Uh, last year when we did our first tour, that the emotions in the room, they are the same everywhere I go. Sometimes I can feel the expectations from the people are like blown away and there’s something completely new, born in the room that everyone finds [00:11:00] themselves in it on this magical moment. People actually get my honesty on stage and who I am and what, why. I wanna share my, my feelings with everyone without actually explaining so much. I’m just singing in my own language and being myself. I had a very amazing experience in America last year. What was really amazing for me to see many Turkish people in the audience, I was a bit worried that not so many Turkish people will come because the first target group of this music being an international band from Europe, but playing music with roots from Turkey is like the target group is not Turkish people.
Derya Yildirim: You know, the target group is everyone who likes that style of music. And then you see like people, like really young people, you see very old people. You see like different ethnicities in the crowd. It’s like it’s everywhere. The same in the world when we play, there’s always different kind of kinds of [00:12:00] people who have a sense of taste, you know? And I felt it even more intense in, in America. Also the way how people enjoy themselves is, is different than in other places of the world, I feel.
Ears of Maize: Especially knowing that your music sort of walks this line of tradition and folk music, but also with this balance of, you know, pushing new ground and original music and creating the next chapter. Can you speak to sort of how that, from a songwriting side of things, how that sort of came together or how you delineate between living and working in that side of traditional, what’s already established versus sort of pushing new ground? On your latest record Yarin Yoksa it looked like you have nine originals and then like three traditional songs represented on this. How do you sort of split that in your mind as to the music that you make or the sound that you enjoy performing?
Derya Yildirim: First of all, like we create music together, like we are real band, like making music together and [00:13:00] sharing our ideas and exchanging, developing, and erasing, sometimes, deleting. I don’t know, like there’s a, like a whole thing of how to make music together.
Derya Yildirim: It’s a very important part of our life as group. I mean, we never really separate these things. Even a folk song cover or a standard that we actually play again, our version, we see it like our own song or our own, our own vision and style and taste in it. The cool challenge is, like, for me, that’s, that’s so much fun for me to cover songs is to actually, to understand what is the core and keeping it and putting everything around that and preserving a culture in a, in an amazing way.
Derya Yildirim: This is my, this is my thing, you know? I’m very conscious about it. I know when things are wrong somehow and I can’t really explain why. And sometimes I do can explain why. And the cool thing is [00:14:00] with our own songs, like we have no limit in that sense. That’s why it’s, it’s almost more fun actually to write own songs ’cause you can find yourself in it and put this little magical taste of the bağlama with only one melody in it, you know? And then it’s completely changing.
Ears of Maize: I love that.
Derya Yildirim: One tracks called Bilemedim Ki. That song, there was actually no bağlama somehow, and then we put it later in the very end. So I don’t know, it’s, it’s not necessary to have bağlama everywhere. It’s, it’s just the way how you, how you develop the music and sometimes it is there and it’s the main thing. And when you produce a song, then. It can just disappear but still have the core of the, of the magic. It’s an amazing adventure and we had so much fun to do this album. I think that was my, one of my favorite projects so far.
Ears of Maize: That’s awesome. I love the way you sort of break it down where again, it feels like it’s a little bit of something new, a little bit of something [00:15:00] old, and then just this like space in between to just leave yourself open to creative magic. Right.
Derya Yildirim: Yeah. Exactly
Ears of Maize: in sort of looking at, you know, the greater timeline of. Again, you know, this tradition and this, this sound that’s so inherent to this record and, and the band, do you consciously think at all about legacy or your contributions to, to this sound or the music or where it fits into sort of the greater timeline? Or are you just out to sort of have fun and creatively make magic and see what happens?
Derya Yildirim: Oh, definitely. I think there is a mission that I’m following. More and more I understand that this is actually my, my engine. You know, this is why I’m alive, to establish this instrument. To establish it in places where it, um, it didn’t have the opportunity to grow, like in clubs, in theater halls, in Elbharmonie in the Grand Hall of this prestige place. Like it belongs there. know, it’s like, it’s a, it’s an amazing instrument that it can touch so many [00:16:00] people, especially as a Turkish person born in Germany, carrying this heritage with me and being a mirror of a society which is oppressed and which is a minority in Germany. We are here for more than 60 years, and we brought a crazy culture here, you know, to Germany.
Derya Yildirim: Turkish psychedelic music was also produced in Germany. Like most of the songs that you probably listen to are produced in Germany because it was forbidden in in Turkey. Pressing and producing more than millions of records and cassettes here in Germany and stuff. You know, it’s a crazy thing what, what happened in the last sixty years here in Germany. And I think we need people, um, with the same mindset like mine to, to grow together because I can’t fight alone. And we have amazing musicians and artists carrying this heritage.
Ears of Maize: I’m curious, like if you have other contemporaries. [00:17:00 in this, this sort of new chapter of sound, or are there folks out there that either you’re listening to or that you think are, are good examples of what’s happening in sort of the writing of this next chapter of Neo Turkish psych?
Derya Yildirim: It’s definitely Turkish psychedelic music. There’s so many bands in the last 10 years. There’s so many Turkish psychedelic bands building up, you know, there’s, there’s a reason why this music has its revival and actually not, it’s not a revival anymore. It’s like it’s their own language. It’s like we, we try to. Uh, how do you say, reclaim it for ourselves and actually find our own language in it. This generation is so lost, especially in Europe and in Germany. We need music that is ours where we can actually express ourselves and know who we are and where we from and where we want to go and stuff. You know. I always find it cool, and that was always part of my life, but it’s more like a [00:18:00] mission.
Derya Yildirim: I never reclaimed. It was always mine. You know, like I’m talking for my generation. This is also one of our goals for this album. We say that often, that we wanna be the sound of our generation to reflect ourselves and ask each other, what would you do if there’s no tomorrow? That’s why we call the album Yarin Yoksa. It’s like a call for, for our generation, for my people like. What’s going on here? You know, like, are you not willing to reflect yourself? What are you doing in life? Where are you going? And why are you going somewhere? These questions are all related, you know, to the album.
Ears of Maize: I love that. I love the, the purpose and yeah, the intention behind that. Thank you. Yeah. Especially for, say, an American audience or someone who is less familiar with Turkish, Turkish psych or, or even the instrumentation. Is there a place that you would recommend, um, someone start an artist or a song that is favorite of yours or a, a good springboard for [00:19:00] folks that are wanting to sort of dive in and, and hear more?
Derya Yildirim: Oh yeah. There’s so many great artists. Barış Manço is the icon. I mean, he’s a legend. And another one is Arif Sağ. He is the guy who probably played on all the records you’re listening to when you listen to Turkish Psychedelic. He made the bağlama appear in all these albums. He is the master of all the bağlama players, and he’s still alive. He’s still a legend.
Ears of Maize: Your latest record is out entitled Yarin Yoksa on Big Crown Records. You’ll be coming to the Bay Area here on Tuesday, August 5th, playing at Mose Alley in Santa Cruz, as well as Wednesday, August 6th, headlining at The Chapel in San Francisco as part of your West Coast tour. I see that you’re then touring in Germany. Do you have a favorite city to tour or um, a place that you look forward to on your calendar?
Derya Yildirim: Definitely. I mean, first of all, is America. I’m very excited to come back. England is always a must have for me. [00:20:00] Like if I don’t tour in England in a year, something is missing and there’s so many other exciting surprises happening, like live sessions waiting and radio sessions, and I can’t wait to make new recordings.
Ears of Maize: Cool. Yeah. Well, we’re excited to have you, and again, I thank you so much for bringing your sound and the latest record and the band and the music to San Francisco. We’re looking forward to having you.
Derya Yildirim: Okay. Hey, here’s Derya Yildirim from Grup Şimşek, and yeah, I’m very excited for my upcoming America tour. You’re listening to KALX Berkeley, 90.7 fm. And I’m talking about my new album, Yarin Yoksa, which means if there’s no tomorrow.
Ears of Maize: Fantastic. Thank you so much again. Congratulations on the new record and all the best on tour and have fun out there. We’re excited to see you.
Derya Yildirim: See you there.
